‘You weren’t supposed to be here,’ she said, pushing up onto her elbows, her eyes imploring him to hear what she was saying. ‘By the time I’d fallen in love with you and we were...this, it was too late.’
‘Too late?’ He jerked his head back as though she’d struck him. ‘How many times could you have told me the truth?’
‘I wanted to,’ she whispered. ‘But it wasn’t my secret.’
He shook his head, his expression a mix of anger and mistrust. His hair was tousled and loose over his forehead. ‘What we just did—that is the only truth we have shared this week.’
Her orgasm was still subsiding, her mind was fogged, and it took her a moment to hear his words and to make any kind of sense of them.
‘Sex,’ he supplied with dark determination.
A shiver ran the length of her spine.
‘Don’t say that,’ she whispered. ‘It’s been so much more than just a physical thing. Think of every moment we’ve shared and tell me that it’s been a lie.’
‘Easily.’ His smile was grim. ‘It has been a lie. I thought you were someone else. Everything I thought about you was based on misinformation.’
‘No!’ She shook her head, but he continued.
‘We’ve had sexual attraction and desire—incredible chemistry. But that’s not something I can’t get more of. And with someone who won’t be dishonest with every word she breathes.’
Her breath hurt. The very idea of his supplanting her in his bed nauseated her.
‘Rio,’ she said softly, but the word was drenched in the tears that were streaming down her cheeks. ‘I wanted to tell you. So many times. But I promised Cressida and...’ She thought guiltily of the enormous sum Cressida had paid her. How could he forgive her? ‘I had to honour that.’
‘If you say so.’
His detachment hurt far more than the anger. It was so angry.
‘Can you be ready in an hour?’
‘For what?’ Her skirt was ruched around her hips, and her hair was a bird’s nest that spoke of passion and need.
‘To get back to reality,’ he said crisply. ‘I want you off this damned island and out of my life.’
* * *
‘Rafaelo will take you to Sorrento. My helicopter there will take you to Naples, where my jet is fuelled and waiting.’
‘Rio...’
She stared at him, the change in his demeanour impossible to reconcile with the man she’d woken up beside. He’d showered after they’d made love. Only it hadn’t been making love. Not for him. It had been making a point.
She swallowed, the taste of acid burning her throat. ‘Please let me explain.’
He stood at the table, his hands gripping the back of a chair. His knuckles glowed white with tension.
‘Do you think any explanation will fix this?’
She squeezed her eyes shut and nodded.
‘Veramente?’ he demanded. ‘I know nothing about you, Matilda Morgan who works for Art Wyndham, but you know everything about me. Things I have never spoken to another soul I have told you this week. You know me. Surely you know I could never forgive this deception?’
‘I didn’t set out to deceive you,’ she said quickly.
‘What does that matter? The result is the same, whether you planned it or not. And you chose to deceive me even when you knew what we were becoming.’ He shook his head. ‘What I thought we were becoming,’ he corrected with cruel derision in his words.
She sucked in a deep breath. She had to make him understand.